STEPPING Out
THE STORY SO FAR: Vicar’s daughter, Carrie, out of step with the Victorian values of her parents, aspires to go on the stage. After a trip to Yakov’s Variety Show, she resolves to run away to join the troupe. Carrie is happy in her new career. But one night, from the stage, she sees her father in the front row of the stalls. She is terrified he intends to drag her back home and, although she avoids detection, she is told to leave for the trouble she has brought. Pursued by an agent who wants her for a new Paris revue, her career is back on track, but she finds herself facing intense jealousy from the other performers. Just when she thinks she’s won their friendship, Carrie receives an anonymous letter from someone wanting to meet her the very next day.
She recognised the woman immediately by the red hat she said in her note she’d be wearing. Carrie hovered in the doorway. Something momentous was about to happen, she was certain. Did she have the courage to stay to find out what? Or should she turn round, walk away and live the rest of her life in blissful ignorance? But it was too late already. The woman at the table had spotted her and was already rising to her feet.
Carrie’s coffee, untouched, was cold now. On the table in front of her lay two more photos of the same young woman whose photograph was stored in her bag.
‘You must have
